Ballerinas are often associated with beauty, grace, and elegant human forms. In his video En Puntas (‘On Points’), however, artist Javier Perez has managed to preserve all of these elements while also portraying the dark intensity, dedication and even violence that this graceful art form can represent. [Read more...]

En Puntas features ballerina Amelie Segarra dancing the en pointe ballet technique (in which the performer typically dances on the points of their toes) on the tips of huge, menacing kitchen knives in an empty, darkened theater. She struggles to maintain the grace that we typically expect of ballerinas as the knives scrape and stab ever more violently at the grand piano she’s standing on. Her composure, however, is periodically broken as she lets out a scream of frustration at the intense difficulty of her performance.

Coupled with the dark and empty theater she is performing in, the video makes for anything but light viewing. The intensity, frustration and violence of her performance (literally) on the razor’s edge are a testament to the intense dedication and sometimes physical suffering required of ballet performers.

What do you think ?

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There is a beast with heart of cold stone
that dashes like lightning, shreds flesh from bone. //
Bewitched by this beast, I fell to my knees.
My mouth babbled madness and mumbled soft pleas. //
I stared down the ravenous, gnashing dark maw of a cute cuddly kitten with yarn in its paw